Each year, 50% of Americans over the age of 18 develop a musculoskeletal injury that lasts longer than 3 months and requires PT. Patients are expected to conform to the therapy's preset mold. By having to do so, individual patient care needs are overlooked. This structure relies heavily on strength/endurance training and these exercises can be performed only so many ways which causes every patient to be treated the same regardless of their situation.
Patients across this industry are being adversely affected by the system that is currently in place, being a repetitive exercise regimen, and leaving the patient dependent on a circuit of exercises to lead them to recovery. Currently, the patients' recovery is completely reliant on the patient, which is not easy for the working class, students, the elderly, and many others who are fatigued by the time they would have to practice the previously mentioned exercise routine.
U.S. Pat. No. 8,251,874: An exercise device that is able to simulate terrain found in the real world, the device programming can include pictures and videos of the chosen location. The programming can allow the user to experience the topographical changes due to the changing operating parameters. The patent details the physical conditioning of the consumer that purchases this exercise system, this is very impractical this is very impractical for the average consumer; for consumers that already have an exercise system the purchase of the an entirely new system with the heavy programming and mechanical complexities would be outrageously expensive to replace a working system that could alternatively acquire an add-on device to achieve the same effect for the consumers “physical conditioning.” Although this exercise system is highly customizable, the programming for such control over multiple operating parameters would be very costly to mass produce and even more so costly for the consumer because of the margin of profit the inventor and the manufacturer would require. The design of this system is highly impractical overall unless the outlook for manufacturing costs are low and the consumer price follows a steady trend. Exercise systems for simulating real world terrain “provides a user with the opportunity to engage in simulating real world terrain comprised of instructive or ideal images and/or adoptable, controllable images” this feature is not a necessity of functionality and is more so geared towards a virtual reality simulation; this is good for specialized training simulations but for the average user or those in physical therapy this is excessive. This type of simulation can also cause symptoms similar to motion sickness.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,205,800: The all terrain treadmill is a treadmill with a monitor and a video player; speed and slope will be synchronized with the chosen terrain, “the machine can be programmed and fed into a control system and a video can be displayed on the video screen synchronized with the control of the grade of the platform.” The all terrain treadmill is similar to the previously mentioned patent, it requires heavy program synchronization with the mechanical inter-workings of the treadmill. Like the previously mentioned patent it is not cost effective for the consumer by using unnecessary virtual reality components.
US20070298937: Surface modified exercise belt for a treadmill is an exercise belt that simulates the natural ground; to strengthen the muscles of the user's ankles. The modified surface is either protrusions or attached pads of varied shape, thickness, hardness, and spacing. A kit is provided containing pads of varying shapes, thickness, and hardness attachable via an adhesive. The kit allows users to randomize and customize the lateral shape of the uniformly placed protrusions. The users being able to create different lateral shapes can cause the belt to have design errors such as: the clearance area of the belt can be altered which is a tedious task for the user to keep in mind; if the user makes a mistake they could potentially ruin the belt because of adhesive could be ripped off and this is inconvenient for the user. The belt should be a module in the user's training process and is not supposed to be infinitely changing, there is going to be a plateau just like every other form of exercise. Although this design focuses on strengthening the user's ankles it can be done in a less complicated way.
US20130274067: The System and method for simulating environmental conditions on an exercise device is an exercise system includes a simulation system simulating terrain based on environmental and real world conditions using topographical data, a location can be simulated. The exercise system may include speed, incline, and other mechanisms. This is a very specific training system that would be very expensive to implement into the life of an everyday consumer and would be very costly, especially because the profit margin for the inventor and the manufacture is high due to the programming and the hardware required to mass produce an exercise system of this capacity that uses such a wide pool of data which includes almost every location in the world. This is very impractical for the everyday consumer and even institutions such as hospitals, and physical therapy facilities.
U.S. Pat. No. 7,833,135: The stationary exercise equipment is a control system and method for exercise equipment provides a way to simulate exercise. The machine allows the user to experience physical activity to be simulated rather than using exercise equipment. This type of simulation can be very helpful however the user has to implement such equipment and with the other innovations available with updated technology makes it harder to justify. There is also the “real world” simulation that this is missing, it is a gentle exerciser that can preserve the joints of the user but it may not be able to strengthen the correct joins because the simulation of exercise is very limited.
The prior inventions and innovations are all so similar with using rubber as the protrusions to simulate a rockier terrain. Terrain is something that is similar in many ways and there will always be overlap between designs however glass beads are more similar to the way that rocks feel underneath the user's feet, rubber has some flexibility and rocks do not. The glass beads are sturdy enough to be able to be roughly handled as they will not break and can handle a considerable amount to pressure and stress. The texture modifiable terrain belt is uses a silicone base which encases the glass beads securely and has more real terrain simulation than a foam or padding.
Prior inventions are hard to implement into physical therapy practices or hospitals or even the average household because many of them are exercise systems or machines that are costly to produce and even more so costly to buy due to the company profits. The Mod belt can be added to a wide array of pre-existing exercise machines or can even be utilized without a machine. The design is space conscious and is not too bulky, prior inventions are not very versatile in the sense that they cannot be easily implemented into any circumstance such as physical therapy practices, hospitals, or even the average household. Many of these prior inventions are exercise systems or stand-alone machines that take up space, is costly to produce and purchase, and cannot be added to a pre-existing apparatus.